Josie silver – Christina de Vries

I listen to an audiobook version of One Day in December on Audible.

Genre: Fiction, Romance, Contemporary

Publisher: Random House Audio (audiobook)

Originally published: October 16th, 2018

Pages: 416 (paperback)

Audiobook length: 10 Hours 27 Minutes

Blurb by the publisher:

Laurie is pretty sure love at first sight doesn’t exist. After all, life isn’t a scene from the movies, is it? But then, through a misted-up bus window one snowy winter’s day, she sees a man she knows instantly is the one. Their eyes meet, there’s a moment of pure magic…and then her bus drives away.

Laurie thinks she’ll never see the boy from the bus again. But at a party a year later, her best friend Sarah introduces her to the new love of her life. Who is, of course, the boy from the bus.

Determined to let him go, Laurie gets on with her life. But what if fate has other plans?

Following Laurie, Sarah and Jack through ten years of love, heartbreak, and friendship, One Day in December is an uplifting, heart-warming and immensely moving love story that you’ll want to escape into forever, for fans of Jojo Moyes, Lucy Diamond, and Nicholas Sparks.

My Thoughts:

Right before Christmas 2018, I felt like I saw the cover of this book everywhere! I don’t know what it is about that, but sometimes it just completely puts me off wanting to read it. It was kind of like that with One Day in December as well. I didn’t feel drawn to it, I was so sure it was just some cheesy romance with a whole lot of too much Christmas crammed into it.

I judged the book by its cover (come on, all of us book lovers do from time to time), and I was wrong.

I found myself searching for my lacking Christmas spirit and decided that I was going to use my Audible credit on a Christmassy audiobook, but I didn’t want to go for one of the classics. Suddenly this book popped up again, and I took the time to read some of the non-spoiler reviews, and I was convinced to give it a go.

Where I thought I would we overwhelmed by an overly cheesy back and forth love story, I got so much more. This is a story about friendship, as much as it is about love. I loved hearing about Laurie and Sarah’s friendship, as I could relate to a lot of the struggle and the wonders of having such a strong friendship with someone.

The characters developed a lot through the story as well, and it was nice to see a set of characters that were actually quite relatable. They had the ups and downs of normal life.

And I got to say, Josie Silver sure added some funny and somewhat cringey scenes that had me giggling.

Yes, it is a romance novel! Yes, it has Christmas in it, but a lot less than I expected!

I was prepared to not like this book, and I did not go in with high expectations, but I ended up really enjoying this one! I was immersed in the story of Laurie and Jack, told by both perspectives. I found it to be an addictive read (or listen on my part) and one that I just flew through.

The only thing that took it down from a top-rated review for me was that everything kind of resolved whirlwind quick at the end.

But still, this is a story that has stuck with me more so than any other love story I’ve read in a while. Highly recommend if you’re looking for something light, fun and romantic!